Recession-hit BPO employees 'on the bench'

BPO employees
were once thriving with so many job opportunities, but are now feeling the heat of the economic slowdown, as call centres have begun cutting back on jobs.

In the NCR region - Noida and Gurgaon - worried about actually laying off people, some companies are resorting to putting them on the bench.

For three months, Anshul Kumar has not reported to the call centre where he has worked for two years. Officially, he hasn't been sacked. He's been told he's "on the bench" and his id card has been taken back. He can't show up at work and he doesn't get paid.

"The process we moved to after spending more than two years in the programme faced a lot of issues due to recession. It was downsizing at that time so they decided to put us on bench. Like any other employee, I wanted to grow with the company and get recognition but it didn't go that way. It really feels bad," said Anshul Kumar.

Putting young workers on the bench is one way of controlling costs. Here's another.

A Noida-based BPO no longer offers transport to employees who live further than 45 km away. So employees in Gurgaon and Faridabad, or parts of Delhi like Rithala, need to assemble at a pick-up point even at 3 am.

"Cost cutting is essential today. It's important to be more productive and reduce all the wastages we are living with. When four cabs are going to the same location, you can get a bus to do the same job," said Deepak Ohlyan, president, Business Process.

With the deepening financial crisis in the US, that accounts for 70 per cent of the BPO business, cost reduction and productivity improvement are the two most commonly heard words in call centres in the past few months.

In simple English, that means longer and tougher hours.

Those who answer phones have to spend nine hours instead of eight taking calls, which means longer shifts for answering calls. Administrative and support staff also have to take calls now and vacation time has been shortened.

"Stopping free meals or deducting money for transport, that is still ok. We are still earning, but if we loose our jobs after that due to recession, it really hurts because you don't know what's going to happen to you after that," said Anshul.

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IBM quietly cuts thousands of jobs

With the recession forcing tech companies to announce thousands of layoffs, IBM Corp. is joining the fray — but not advertising it.
The Armonk, New York-based company has cut thousands of jobs over the past week, including positions in sales as well as the software and hardware divisions. IBM says the cuts are simply part of its ongoing efforts to watch costs, and the company won't release specific numbers, even as reports of firings stream in from IBM facilities across the country.
Workers have reported layoffs in Tucson, Arizona; San Jose, California; Rochester, Minnesota; Research Triangle Park, North Carolina; East Fishkill, New York; Austin, Texas; and Burlington, Vermont.
Meanwhile, other tech companies such as Intel Corp.,Microsoft Corp., Texas Instruments Inc., Sprint Nextel Corp. and Google Inc. have all publicly revealed job cuts as part of their strategies for riding out the economic crisis. More than 20,000 jobs will be lost from those companies.
One of IBM's biggest rivals — Hewlett-Packard Co. — is also laying people off. HP is shedding 24,600 jobs, nearly 8 percent of its 320,000 employee work force, as it digests the acquisition of Electronic Data Systems Corp.
IBM says it doesn't have to reveal the number of jobs it is cutting, since the Securities and Exchange Commission requires companies to disclose only "material" events. And IBM considers its job cuts a regular part of the company's business model, since thousands of jobs are cut every year but are usually added back in other places.
Because of that, IBM contends it doesn't have to break out its layoffs in regulatory filings unless it suddenly changes course and makes substantially more or fewer job cuts.
That's why while IBM's head count keeps growing, topping 400,000 at the end of 2008, laid-off IBM workers have flooded online job boards with complaints about the company's stealth cuts.
One estimate of IBM's recent cuts put the number at more than 4,000 jobs lost since IBM's fourth-quarter earnings announcement last week. Those earnings contained an unexpected surprise: IBM forecast at least $9.20 per share in profit in 2009. IBM shares are up more than 10 percent since then.
To get the cost savings that will help spur the higher profits, IBM appears to have acted quickly. The estimate of at least 4,000 jobs cut comes from AllianceAtIBM, a union that is affiliated with the Communications Workers of America and represents a small number of IBM workers.
The Associated Press reviewed one document sent to laid-off workers that identified some of the positions that were cut. Employees weren't identified by name, but positions and the workers' ages were listed. The document listed nearly 3,000 jobs.
In Vermont, IBM remained tightlipped about layoffs at its Essex Junction facility, but state Labor Commissioner Patricia Moulton Powden said the total number would be less than 500.
IBM recently employed 5,300 workers at the Essex Junction plant, down from 8,500 in 2001.
Jim Gallo, 48, who said he worked in IBM Software support for 27 years, was among those let go from that facility. Gallo, drinking a Grey Goose and ginger ale at nearby Lincoln Inn on Tuesday, said he hadn't told his four children yet.
He said he has until Feb. 26 to find another job in IBM, but he put his chances at "slim to none." Gallo said he gets six months' pay as part of a severance package.
"It's too bad they're not doing what they were doing before. They offered some sweet packages for people to jump out," he said.
IBM's ongoing labor adjustments have led the company to add bodies in cheaper and higher-growth parts of the world, like India.
In 2007, the last full year for which detailed employment numbers are available, 121,000 of IBM's 387,000 workers were in the U.S., down slightly from the year before. Meanwhile, staffing in India has jumped from just 9,000 workers in 2003 to 74,000 workers in 2007.

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